The Adjutant greeted us all except Guskov, and sat down beside me where the latter had been.
Paul Dmitrich, whom I had always known as a calm, deliberate, strong gambler and a moneyed man, was now very different from what he had been in the flourishing days of his card-playing. He seemed to be in a hurry, kept looking round at everybody, and before five minutes were over he, who always used to be reluctant to play, now proposed to Lieutenant O⸺ that the latter should start a “bank.”
Lieutenant O⸺ declined, under pretext of having his duties to attend to; his real reason being that, knowing how little money and how few things Paul Dmitrich still possessed, he considered it unwise to risk his three hundred rubles against the hundred or less he might win.
“Is it true, Paul Dmitrich,” said the Lieutenant, evidently wishing to avoid a repetition of the request, “that we are to leave here tomorrow?”
“I don’t know,” replied Paul Dmitrich, “but the orders are, to be ready! But really we’d better have a game: I would stake my Kabarda horse.”
“No, today …”
“The grey one. Come what may! Or else, if you like, we’ll play for money. Well?”
“Oh, but I—I would readily—you must not think—” began Lieutenant O⸺, answering his own doubts, “but, you know, we may have an attack or a march before us tomorrow, and I want to have a good sleep.”
The Adjutant rose, and putting his hands in his pockets began pacing up and down. His face assumed the usual cold and somewhat proud expression which I liked in him.
“Won’t you have a glass of mulled wine?” I asked.